Opinion

From the critics

Community Activity

Comment

What I enjoyed about this book were the chapters where the author took a break from trying so hard to be over-the-top quirky and instead detailed difficult situations where her anxiety was debilitating and showed how she dealt with it. That angle was compelling. She's skillful at adding humor at the right time to show how she manages through her painful experiences.

The rest of the book, OY! Yes, she's funny, but she tries waaay too hard to prove it. Toward the end, it was tedium. I'm all for weird and different. I love Sedaris and appreciate Burroughs but I found Lawson to be too loquacious.

This book is hilarious for readers that love awkward situations and people (I am one of those people!) It includes stories of her upbringing as well as her adult life that are laugh out loud. I love every strange encounter and situation Jenny Lawson gets herself into because her feelings are relatable even if the event is not. A great read!

Warning: Jenny has a potty mouth. Which is fine with me, but I know a lot of people don't appreciate that.
This (sort of) memoir is somewhere between David Sedaris and Augustin Burroughs - easily as funny as both, and with vignettes of the same type of screwed-up childhood that both (especially Burroughs) experienced. There are a few slow spots, but there are several places in the book that made me laugh out loud. (In Subway.)

I am not one for spit takes but this book caused so much involuntary laughter from me, that I highly recommend having a mouth full of some sort of food or drink while reading "Let's Pretend This Never Happened." That way those around you can enjoy this book as much as you do.

A wonderfully weird book. I'm especially fond of the disturbing childhood stories because representation matters. Word Virus Book Club selection November 2015.

pj2thek
Aug 19, 2015

update!
this is officially the most entertaining, funniest book ive ever read. holy frickin smokes. i loved it. i wish i could get a chick as crazy cool as jenny lawson. i wish!

ok. this is a premature review cuz i'm only a small way thru. but! it is crazy hilarious! i say u better put a hold on it soon. she's like a chick dave barry, but alot funnier. i pretty much laffed out loud on every page. seriously. wait. 3 pages i didnt. out of like, 100 so far. i almost want to buy this so i can use some of her quotes so i can sound funny and witty!

Quotes

There's a very mean girl down the hall who's trying to get me fired. I'm no good with confrontation, so whenever I say, "Have a wonderful day," to her out loud, I'm really saying, "Be nice to me or I will stab you in the face with a fork," in my head. I wish her a wonderful day at least once an hour. She's starting to get paranoid and jumpy about it, but there's really nothing she can do, because she can't complain about me wishing her a wonderful day without sounding totally insane. This is why you should never mess with non-confrontational people. Because they're unstable to second-guess. And because they're totally the kind of people who would suddenly snap, and stab you in the face with a fork.

This book is a love letter to my family. It's about the surprising discovery that the most terribly human moments - the ones we want to pretend never happened - are the very same moments that make us who we are today. I've reserved the very best stories of my life for this book...to celebrate the strange, and to give thanks for the bizarre. Because you are defined not by life's imperfect moments, but by your reaction to them. And because there is joy in embracing - rather than running screaming from - the utter absurdity of life. I thank my family for teaching me that lesson. In spades.

My ag teacher told us once, years ago, a student was hanging a cotton-judging banner on the ag barn wall when he fell off of the ladder and landed on a broomstick, which went right up his rectum. This idea must have really stuck with my teacher, because he was forever warning us to be constantly vigilant of any stray brooms in the area before getting on a ladder

Druggies can be surprisingly judgmental. It's pretty much the only social circle where the same people you just witnessed shooting horse tranquilizers up one another's butts will actually look down at you for not being as cool as them.

My grandmother... was one of the sweetest and most patient women ever to grace the planet. ... (she) would describe Hitler as a "sad little man who probably didn't get hugged enough when he was little," and would say only of Satan, "I'm not a fan."

There are three types of people who choose a career in HR: sadistic ____ who were probably all tattletales in school, empathetic (and soon-to-be-disillusioned) idealists who think they can make a difference in the lives of others, and those who of us who stick around because it gives you the best view of all the most entertaining train wrecks happening in the rest of the company.

Most people have never stood inside a dead animal, unless you count that time when Luke Skywalker crawled inside that tauntaun to keep from freezing to death, which I don't, because Star Wars is not a documentary.

Summary

A memoir detailing growing up in a small town with an eccentric father who partakes in taxidermy and animal rescue. Then continuing though the author's awkward teen and young adult years with plenty of wit and humour like no other.